What we learn from recent elections in India

In an extraordinary move one fine evening in November last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced sudden withdrawal of 86% of India’s currency in circulation, in what he termed as a crackdown on black money. In a predominantly cash based economy like India, it was an unprecedented move and has no parallel anywhere in the world. While the last word on “notebandi” has not been said yet, several elections – both local bodies and states - since then confirm voters have not been averse to the action. This is in sharp contrast to what was shown incessantly on electronic media during those eventful days of acute currency shortages. Besides a verdict on demonetization, here are some takeaways from recent elections in the country not just in the five states that went to polls last month, but elsewhere as well.

Democracy is flourishing in India as voters demand performance & accountability

The mainstream media has no touch with reality. I wonder how they justify the crores they get as salary. For example, the sheer scale of BJP’s election victory in Uttar Pradesh is mindboggling. Yet, throughout the election campaign, the media painted a picture of a keen contest between the “UP ke ladke” Vs. Narendra Modi, with Mayawati’s BSP thrown in for some additional spice. The media narrative portrayed a largely equal fight, or occasionally an edge to the BJP depending on whom you believed. As if to justify prior coverage, the exit polls also reflected similar trends, with BJP a bit ahead of the rest but not too much. But it all fell flat when the results were declared. This is true not just for U.P. but elsewhere as well. Recall that the non-stop coverage for more than a month of the poor “suffering” in bank queues (some even died!) also turned out to be top class fiction. Clearly, if you are watching too much TV, especially the newsroom debates & “expert” analyses, you are wasting your time. Go, get a life.

There is no substitute for hard work. Narendra Modi’s charisma sits on top of several decades of solid ground level work by RSS & several of its affiliate organizations in the remotest corners of the country. You cannot build a sustainable electoral model without some real groundwork & voter connect at the grassroots. Mulayam Singh Yadav built Samajwadi Party from scratch. He has spent his whole life in the rough & tumble of U.P.’s realpolitik, connecting with people, building relations and nurturing the party to what it is. In the 2012 U.P. State Assembly elections, people voted for Samajwadi Party with “Netaji” in mind. But it was Akhilesh who was made the CM. You can inherit party posts but not the personal touch & rapport with the people. You have to build that yourself. Governing a State & showcasing a couple of projects is one thing, having a grassroots level connect with the people that makes them vote for you again & again is another. It is no surprise that cutting across party lines, one can see that most second generation politicians are failures.

There are no shortcuts to success, no substitute for real groundwork and people connect

Leadership matters. In Uttar Pradesh, Narendra Modi staked his personal reputation at risk and led the battle from the front. There is no doubt that BJP could not have pulled off such a huge success if Modi had stayed away from campaigning or only made token appearances. Ideology has ceased to matter. Choosing your party is no longer a question of ideology you subscribe to. All parties call themselves socialist and secular. Nobody reads party manifestos. Even freebies have ceased to matter, if only because everyone promises a bountiful of them, so the factor gets neutralized. People want forceful, decisive leadership.

There are no vote banks. The “secular” narrative is dead. Sixty five percent of India’s population is below the age of 35. The median age of an Indian is 27.6 years. The generation which saw Partition has passed away. To a large section of today’s voters, even the Ayodhya demolition is “history”. And voters are no longer swayed by what happened in history. The BJP has successfully shed its “communal” label. Even Muslim attitudes towards BJP are changing. But like an Ostrich who buries its head in the sand, the old generation “secular” politicians - most of them past their retirement age - refuse to see this reality. Even the caste factor is overrated. Just because one can generate caste-wise statistics and blabber some nonsense, it does not follow that voters who cast their vote ‘vote their caste’. Even where a correlation exists between the caste of the electorate & the elected, it does not prove causation. I have not seen a single survey or opinion poll which asked the voters why they voted for a candidate they did, and majority of the voters pointed to caste as the driving factor. No wonder sand it slipping from under the feet of parties who thrived on such narrow agendas. In an article three years back, I called such parties “Dodos of Indian Politics”.  

Voters have become demanding. Television & radio has reached every home. Internet penetration is increasing rapidly. Literacy has improved significantly over the years. People are much more aware of what’s happening in & around them. You just can’t take them for a ride anymore with empty promises. The voters have become demanding, and politicians who fail to deliver get thrown out. This is repeatedly getting proved one election after another, be it in Nitish Kumar retaining Bihar, or the Akalis losing Punjab. 

Despite its recent spate of successes, even BJP cannot rest on its laurels. It will have to deliver genuine improvements to the lives of the people. Otherwise the same fate awaits them.

MCGM Election Results: NOTAP beats AOPPT

I know this is a trifle late, but I was away and could not find time to write. Here I am putting down some thoughts on the results of the just concluded MCGM elections.

Firstly, that even before the counting had begun, the real results of the elections were clear. More people opted for the “NOTA Party” (None Of The Above Party) than “AOPPT” (All Other Parties Put Together). The city recorded average voter turnout of around 45 % with the highest voting percentage in any constituency at  49.50 %. Not a single constituency had more than 50 % people going out to vote.

This has been interpreted by many as “voter apathy”. “……Mumbaikars have lost the right to complain……”, “…….Mumbaikars just don’t care……” and so on. Some also commented on the turnout  being lower in the affluent areas of the city than the less affluent. I even heard one “expert" say on T.V. that Mumbaikars have so much money that they spend half their time abroad, and so it doesn’t matter to them who governs MCGM.  Nothing can be farther from truth! 

There should be no mistaking the fact that the real reason for low voter turnout was that there were no  worthwhile candidates to vote for! It is an outright rejection of all candidates who contested the elections. This should be an eye opener for all the parties contesting the polls, and especially for whoever is in the opposition. If you want to dislodge a ruling party, you need to provide a worthy alternative. If you cannot even create a glimmer of hope in the minds of the voter, he is not going to waste his holiday! This is the message from the Mumbai elections. I am not justifying this approach, in fact I believe everyone must vote (see the previous blogpost here), but there is no doubt that this is the message the people have given.

I also find the “affluent people don’t care” theory a little difficult to digest. True, voter turnout in areas such as Malabar Hill, Peddar Road and Juhu have been shown to be lower than some of the slums and lower income areas. But using the same statistics, one can say that voting percentage was lower in the educated sections of the society, than the less educated. Liquor bottles and chicken biryani cannot be used to bring the Juhu voter out of his home, though it may work in the slums of Cheetah Camp or Kanjurmarg.

Some have observed that the Marathi dominated areas have shown higher voter turnouts than non-Marathi speaking areas. This once again shows the importance of having an “alternative”. The disgruntled (with the present governance) Marathi manoos perhaps found hope in Raj Thackeray’s MNS but the non-Maharashtrians had no one to look up to. Interestingly, the Congress propped up MNS in its early years in the hope that it (MNS) will finish the Shiv Sena, but the MNS seemed to have gained at the cost of Congress itself. While the MNS gained substantially in the elections, the Sena did not lose much. It is the Congress whose strength has come down from 71 to 51.

This is the real story of Mumbai elections - a fit case for Rule 49 – O! (Right to Reject all candidates).

Voting rules for the elections

It is election time in Mumbai, so I am framing some guiding principles that I plan to follow in this, and all the subsequent elections. You too can do the same!

1. I will ensure that I cast my vote. It is not only my right & duty; it is also a privilege to vote. How much ever imperfect our democracy may be, democracy it is, and I am lucky to be born in one. Almost half the people in this world do not have the privilege to vote. Remember the adage: “Bad governments are elected by good citizens who do not vote”. If we do not exercise our franchise, we may lose it one day. 

2. I will research candidates in my constituency. With the advent of technology and increased transparency in recent years, citizens have better access to information about the parties and their candidates than before. I will use it. If I can spend three hours watching a movie, I might as well spend some time researching who will maintain the roads I walk on, supply the water I drink or decide what to do with the tax I pay from my hard earned salary.

3. The person is more important than the party. The simple rule here is that a good person in a bad party is better than a bad person in a good party. So I will vote for the candidate, not for the party.

4. I will not vote for the known devil. I will not vote for a candidate who was elected in the past  but did nothing for the people, or has a corrupt or criminal background, or reveals wealth that does not justify his known professional or educational status.

5. I will not presume that everyone is bad. If the major parties do not put up candidates who are good enough, there are always fringe political parties or even unknown independents whom I can vote for. I don’t see any harm in voting for the unknown ones when the known ones are failing my test. If nothing else, I can use education as a criterion to decide whom to vote for. Not that it is a fool-proof criterion, but atleast it is better than voting on the basis of religion, caste, language, fame or good looks.

6. I will not worry about how others vote. Whether the candidate I vote for can win or not, or whether his party can form the government or not, is irrelevant to my decision of whom to vote. Remember that we not only elect our government, but also our opposition! In a democracy, having a good and effective opposition is as important as having a good government. 

I hope these rules will help me in choosing the right candidates, or atleast prevent me from choosing the wrong ones. If everyone does the same, we will have Ram Rajya one day.